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The  Success  of  Defeat 


Speak,  History,  who  are  life's  victors?  unroll  thy  long 
annals  and  say  — 

Are  they  those  whom  the  world  called  the  victors,  icho 
won  the  success  of  a  day? 

The  martyrs,  or  Nero  ?  the  Spartans  who  fell  at  Ther- 
mopylae's tryst, 

Or  the  Persians  and  Xerxes?  his  judges,  or  Socrates? 
Pilate  or  Christ? 

IO    VICTIS :    W.    W.    STORY 


THE  SUCCESS  OF 
DEFEAT 

BY 

Maltbie  D.  Babcock,  D.D. 


NEW  YORK 
Charles  Scribner's  Sons 

1905 


COPYRIGHT,    1905,    BY    CHARLES    SCRIBNER?S    SONS 
PUBLISHED    SEFfEMBER,    1905 


T 


D.    B.    UPDIKE,    THE    MERRYMOUNT    PRESS,    BOSTON 


PREFACE 

THIS  Address  was  first  given  in  the 
city  of  Baltimore  in  1893,  before  the 
Convention  of  the  Maryland  Christian 
Endeavor  Union — students  and  wage- 
earners,  young  men  and  young  women. 
Its  issue  in  printed  form  in  the  Report 
of  that  Convention,  and  later  as  a  sepa- 
rate pamphlet,  has  been  so  eagerly 
sought  for  that  for  some  time  it  has  been 
entirely  unobtainable.  This  new  edition 
is  therefore  put  forth  in  further  re- 
sponse to  the  strong  demand  for  it. 

Dr.  Babcock's  habit  of  rarely  putting 
his  sermons  in  full  on  paper,  but  al- 
most invariably  confining  himself  to 
brief,  almost  cryptographic  notes,  gives 


PREFACE 

to  this  the  added  interest  of  being  one 
of  the  very  few  of  his  public  addresses 
to  be  had  in  its  entirety. 

This  sermon  stands  preeminent  as  a 
revelation  of  its  author  s  courage  and 
hopefulness,  and  of  his  power  of  com- 
municating these  qualities  to  others. 
The  day  following  its  delivery  an  an- 
onymous note  came  to  Dr.  Babcock 
with  this  question, — "Could  you  have 
given  that  address,  and  meant  every 
word  of  it,  if  you  were  living  in  a  loft 
on  seven  cents  a  day  ?  "  Unlike  the  usual 
fate  of  such  notes,  it  escaped  the  waste- 
paper  basket.  Every  possible  inquiry 
was  made,  but  no  trace  of  the  writer 
could  be  found. 

Six  months  or  more  afterward,  in  a 
distant  city,  the  same  sermon  was  given, 
with  the  story  of  the  anonymous  note 


PREFACE 

told  in  full.  After  the  service  a  man 
came  forward  saying,  "Dr.  Babcock, 
I  think  I  know  your  seven  cents  a  day 
man.  In  fact,  I  know  of  two  men 
struggling  in  your  city  for  a  medical 
education  on  just  about  that  sum." 

The  search  again  began,  and  after 
months  two  men  were  found  living  in 
the  belfry  of  a  Church  in  a  distant 
quarter  of  the  city.  Wellnigh  crushed 
by  their  circumstances,  cynical  as  to 
their  future,  they  were  almost  in  despair 
when  they  heard  this  sermon.  Under 
the  inspiration  which  that  gave,  and 
under  Dr.  Babcocks  personal  influence, 
their  new  courage  and  hope  soon  gave 
a  further  illustration  from  real  life  of 
the  truth  and  power  of  this  address. 


I    SING   THE    HYMN    OF   THE    CONQUERED,  WHO    FELL   IN 
THE    BATTLE   OF    LIFE  — 
THE    HYMN    OF   THE    WOUNDED,    THE    BEATEN,   WHO    DIED 

OVERWHELMED    IN    THE    STRIFE: 
NOT    THE    JUBILANT    SONG    OF    THE    VICTORS,    FOR    WHOM 

THE    RESOUNDING   ACCLAIM 
OF  NATIONS  WAS  LIFTED  IN  CHORUS,   WHOSE  BROWS  WORE 

THE    CHAPLET   OF    FAME 

BUT    THE    HYMN    OF    THE    LOW    AND    THE    HUMBLE,    THE 

WEARY,    THE    BROKEN    IN    HEART, 

WHO    STROVE    AND    WHO    FAILED,    ACTING    BRAVELY   A    SI- 
LENT  AND    DESPERATE    PART; 
WHOSE     YOUTH      BORE     NO     FLOWER     ON     ITS     BRANCHES, 

WHOSE    HOPES    BURNED    IN    ASHES    AWAY  : 
FROM     WHOSE     HANDS     SLIPPED     THE     PRIZE     THEY     HAD 

GRASPED   AT:    WHO    STOOD    AT   THE    DYING    OF    DAY 
WITH    THE    WORK    OF    THEIR     LIFE    ALL    AROUND    THEM, 

UNPITIED,    UNHEEDED,    ALONE; 
WITH  DEATH  SWOOPING  DOWN  O'ER  THEIR  FAILURE,  AND 

ALL    BUT   THEIR    FAITH    OVERTHROWN. 

IO    VICTIS  :    W.    W.    STORY 


The  Success  of  Defeat 


Abraham  ,  .  Isaac  .  .  Jacob  .  .  Moses  .  .  Gideon  .  . 
Barak  .  .  Samson  .  .  the  prophets ;  who  through  faith 
subdued  kingdoms,  wrought  righteousness,  .  .  escaped 
the  edge  of  the  sword,  out  of  weakness  were  made  strong, 
waxed  valiant  in  fight,  turned  to  flight  the  armies  of  the 
aliens :  others  were  tortured,  not  accepting  deliverance ; 
had  trial  of  cruel  mockinys  and  scourgings  ;  they  were 
stoned,  they  were  sawn  asunder,  were  slain  with  the 
sword; — being  destitute,  afflicted,  tormented;  of  whom 
the  world  was  not  worthy. 

HEBREWS    XI 


THE  SUCCESS  OF 
DEFEAT 

"  T  T  TERE  slain  with  the  sword." 
V  V  What  are  these  words  doing 
here?  This  is  the  chapter  of  an  over- 
coming faith.  I  can  understand  the 
right  of  the  earlier  record,  "Who 
through  faith  subdued  kingdoms, 
wrought  righteousness,  obtained  pro- 
mises, stopped  the  mouths  of  lions, 
quenched  the  violence  of  fire,  escaped 
the  edge  of  the  sword,  waxed  valiant 
in  fight,  turned  to  flight  the  armies  of 
the  aliens."  This  is  the  victory  of  faith, 
this  is  overcoming.  But  what  place 
here  have  the  words  "tortured  and 
mocked  and  scourged,  imprisoned, 
stoned,  sawn  asunder,  slain  with  the 
i 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

sword"?  Just  the  place  God  meant 
them  to  have.  Is  this  the  roll-call  of 
God's  heroes?  Yes.  Who  are  they? 
Those  who  escaped  the  edge  of  the 
sword  and  put  to  flight  the  armies  of 
the  aliens.  Hear  them  answer  to  their 
names — Abraham,  Joshua,  Gideon, 
Barak,  Samson,  Jephthah  and  David. 
But  what  of  the  dead  on  the  field,  who 
were  slain  by  the  sword  ?  God  answers 
for  them.  God  counts  them  worthy  of 
equal  honor — may  I  not  say  of  greater 
honor?  for  it  is  after  their  record  that 
He  adds,  "  of  whom  the  world  was  not 
worthy." 

To  conquer  with  the  sword  is  the  vic- 
tory of  faith.  Is  to  be  slain  by  the  sword 
the  victory  of  faith?  Yes,  if  the  same 
fidelity  fills  each  heart  and  nerves  each 
arm.  To  escape  the  sword  may  mean 
defeat ;  it  may  be  a  disgrace  to  be  alive. 


THE   SUCCESS   OF  DEFEAT 

To  fall  by  the  sword  may  be  triumph ; 
it  may  be  glorious  to  be  dead. 

Failure,  then,  may  not  be  as  black  a 
word  as  it  looks.  It  is  not.  I  believe 
failure  can  be  a  greater  friend  than  foe, 
and  prove  of  sweeter  uses  than  success. 

OUCCESS  and  failure  are  not  like 
day  and  night,  heat  and  cold,  mutually 
exclusive — night  the  absence  of  day, 
and  cold  of  heat.  Success  and  failure 
subtly  interpenetrate. 

The  ground  beneath  the  cherry-trees 
is  white  with  fallen  petals.  If  every 
blossom  set  to  fruit,  would  that  mean 
success  ? 

The  tool  of  the  carver  is  dulled  and 
worn  away.  Is  that  failure  ?  The  chips 
of  his  work  are  all  about  him,  cut  away 
from  the  mother- wood:  is  that  which 
falls  to  the  earth  a  failure? 

3 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

Is  the  dead  soldier's  a  wasted  life? 
What  though  his  arm  can  strike  no 
more — what  though  he  is  buried  in  a 
nameless  grave! 

Can  you  see  the  success  of  failure? 
Did  the  blossom  fail  that  withered  in 
obedience  to  that  law  that  sought  for 
quality  rather  than  amount  of  fruit? 
Did  thechisel  fail  that,  in  wearing  away 
the  wood,  was  itself  worn  away  for  very 
faithfulness  ?  Did  the  fragment  fail  that 
fell,  not  from  rottenness,  but  that  the 
vision  and  dream  of  the  carver  might  be 
realized,  that  the  figure  of  beauty  might 
be  led  forth  from  its  long  and  dark  im- 
prisonment? Did  the  brave  heart  fail 
though  the  soldier  fell?  To  gather  the 
spear-points  like  a  sheaf  of  arrows  into 
his  breast  and  make  a  way  for  liberty, 
was  death,  but  no  failure.  It  was  su- 
premest  victory,  consummate  success. 

4 


THE  SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

But  what  if  the  cherry-blossoms 
bloomed  in  vain?  What  if  no  fruit 
ripened  that  year?  What  if  the  carving 
failed,  and  the  cause  was  lost  for  which 
the  warrior  died  ?  That  is  failure !  No, 
a  thousand  times  no !  The  cherry  ovule 
that  did  its  best  to  swell  into  fruit,  the 
tool  that  was  true  steel,  and  the  soul 
faithful  unto  death,  succeeded.  Each 
was  true  to  itself,  each  fulfilled  its  mis- 
sion. Then  the  outward  may  perish 
while  the  inward  is  renewed  ?  Yes !  The 
plan  I  conceive  may  fail,  but  I  be  better 
to  do  and  bear.  The  cause  I  love  may 
go  down,  while  I,  loyal  to  my  convic- 
tions,  true  to  my  post,  blazing  away 
at  my  gun,  am  a  success.  /  need  be 
no  failure. 

Here  we  have  reached  the  splendid 
truth — I  need  be  no  failure !  Come 
what  may,  succeed  or  fail  what  will^I 
5 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

need  be  no  failure.  My  field  may  be 
stony  or  swampy,  my  plough  may  be 
poor,  my  strength  small,  the  weather 
bad ;  but  if  heartily  as  unto  my  Lord_I 
do  the  best  I  can  and  look  not  back 
but  keep  right  on,  I  am  no  failure. 

To  have  a  fair  wind  and  a  sunny  sky 
and  a  tight  boat  is  not  necessarily  to 
be  a  success,  and  to  have  head-winds 
and  cross-cut  tides  and  rain  and  cold 
and  hunger  is  not  of  necessity  to  be  a 
failure;  but  no  matter  what  the  wea- 
ther does,  no  matter  what  the  tides,— 
rain  or  shine,  snow  or  blow,  to  steer  by 
the  stars  and  with  a  true  heart  to  keep 
the  course  as  best  I  can,  is  to  succeed 
and  be  no  failure,  though  my  boat  goes 
down  and  I  am  no  more  known  till  the 
sea  gives  up  its  dead. 

Failure,  then,  is  never  an  absolute 
word — always  relative;  and  the  only 
6 


THE  SUCCESS   OF  DEFEAT 

real  failure  is  inside,  not  outside.  Jt  is 
not  being  true  to  the  best  we  know. 
Inside  failure  is  the  only  calamity.  Out> 
side  failure  may  be  the  greatest  bless- 
ing. Let  me  be  loyal  to  plain  and  pro- 
vidential duty,  true  to  the  best  I  know, 
and  what  seems  failure  will  prove  to  be 
a  means  of  knowledge,  development, 
and  not  seldom  the  bud  of  success. 

Tracing  the  thought  along  these  lines 
in  relation  to  self-knowledge,  strength 
and  success,  by  God's  help  we  shall  get 
some  new  light  on  our  dark  clouds  and 
go  on  our  way  with  a  stouter  heart. 


Self -Know  ledge 

A  MAN  in  a  wrong  place — wrong 
not  for  some  one  else,  but  wrong 
for  him — finds  out  the  fact,  in  failure. 
He  thought  he  had  found  his  niche. 
No,  the  hole  is  a  round  one  and  the 
peg  three-sided.  Perhaps  the  bayonet 
of  circumstance  drove  him  where  he 
is.  Perhaps  it  was  his  father's  fault,  who 
trained  up  the  child  in  the  way  his 
brother  ought  to  have  gone.  Whatever 
the  cause,  the  result  is  the  same.  A  car- 
penter goes  to  do  a  special  piece  of 
work  and  finds  he  has  taken  the  wrong 
tool.  What  is  to  be  done  ?  Get  the  right 
tool,  or,  if  that  is  impossible,  make  the 
best  of  the  one  he  has.  You  may  have 

8 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

discovered  your  mistake.  You  were 
meant  for  business  life  and  are  profes- 
sional, or  are  in  business  life  and  no 
success,  for  your  gifts  run  another  way. 
But  the  choice  has  been  made;  time, 
money,  strength  invested.  What  is  to 
be  done?  If  the  way  is  open  out  of 
the  wrong  to  the  right  place,  go !  For 
every  reason ,  go !  Failure  has  taught  you 
something  about  yourself.  Acknow- 
ledge your  mistake.  It  will  only  prove 
you  a  wiser  man  to-day  than  you  were 
yesterday.  Then  you  were  wrong  and 
did  not  know  it ;  now  you  know  it,  and, 
more,  propose  to  remedy  it. 

But  what  if  it  cannot  be  remedied? 
— for  despite  the  proverb,  it  often  is 
too  late  to  mend.  Then  make  the  best 
of  things  and  of  yourself.  It  is  never 
too  late  to  do  that.  You  have  broken 
your  sword  in  your  ignorance  and  can- 
9 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

not  get  another.  Throw  away  the  half- 
blade?  Never!  Show  what  you  can  do 
with  half  a  blade.  You  can  be  a  suc- 
cess if  you  do  the  best  you  can  with 
your  broken  sword.  Failure  is  not  to 
be  true  to  the  best  you  know,  and  the 
best  you  know  is  to  stay  where  you 
are  and  to  do  what  you  can  as  well  as 
you  can.  Men  may  pity  you  and  call 
you  a  failure.  Never  mind,  that  is  out- 
side. If  you  have  learned  from  outside 
failure  to  be  an  inside  success,  have 
learned  that  God  looks  at  what  a  man 
is,  not  merely  at  wrhat  he  has,  and  have 
resolved  to  please  Him  with  a  broken 
sword  and  an  all  but  broken  spirit,  you 
can  happily  await  His  verdict. 


10 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

OAYS  Joaquin  Miller: 

"  O  great  is  the  hero  who  wins  a  name, 
But  greater  many  and  many  a  time 
Some  pale- faced  fellow  who  dies  in  shame, 
And  lets  God  finish  the  thought  sublime" 

To  learn  that  time  can  finish  nothing 
eternal,  to  learn  that  character  is  what 
God  is  seeking  and  that  it  grows  out 
of  struggle  rather  than  attainment^ 
that  it  is  a  question  of  faithfulness 
rather  than  success,  of  direction  rather 
than  distance ;  that  to  make  the  most  of 
one  talent,  of  half  a  talent,  of  a  broken 
sword,  if  it  is  all  you  have,  is  all  God 
asks  and  will  win  all  the  recognition 
He  can  give  any  one — is  to  learn  a 
priceless  lesson.  If  failure  has  taught 
you  that  it  is  not  how  many  tools  a  man 
has,  but  how  well  he  works  with  what 
he  has,  that  interests  God;  if  failure 


11 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

has  taught  you  that  manhood  is  worth 
more  than  money,  that  money  with- 
out manhood  is  contemptible,  eternal 
bankruptcy ;  that  the  circumstances  of 
life  are  only  its  scaffolding,  within 
which  the  true  temple  of  a  Christlike 
character  is  to  be  built  —  then  you 
should  thank  God  with  full  heart  for 
your  teacher.  To  be  a  workman  that 
needethnot  to  be  ashamed  before  Him 
at  His  coming,  because  doing  the  best 
he  can,  somewhere  else  if  he  can,  where 
he  is  if  he  must,  patient  and  uncom- 
plaining, finding  no  fault  with  God  and 
trying  to  give  God  no  occasion  to  find 
fault  with  him,  growing  in  grace  and 
in  the  knowledge  of  his  Lord  and  Sav- 
iour Jesus  Christ — this  is  to  succeed. 
There  is  no  doubt  about  it ! 

How  vigorously  Browning  holds  and 
expresses  the  truth: 

12 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

on  the  vulgar  mass 
Called  '  •work,''  must  sentence  pass, 
Things  done,  that  took  the  eye  and  had  the 

price; 

O'er  which,from  level  stand, 
The  low  world  laid  its  hand, 
Found  straightway  to  its  mind,  could  value  in 
a  trice. 

"But  all  the  world's  coarse  thumb 

And  finger  failed  to  plumb, 
So  passed  in  making  up  the  main  account: 
All  instincts  immature, 
AU  purposes  unsure, 

That  weighed  not  in  his  work,  yet  swelled  the 
man's  amount: 

"  Thoughts  hardly  to  be  packed 

Into  a  narrow  act, 

Fancies  that  broke  through  language  and  es- 
caped: 

All  I  could  never  be, 
All  men  ignored  in  me, 
This  I  was  worth  to  God,  whose  wheel  the 
pitcher  shaped."  * 

*  "RABBI  BEN  EZRA." 

13 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

Thank  God,  then,  that  failure  may 
show  us  our  right  place,  but,  best  of 
all,  may  show  us  the  value  of  that 
which  is  personal,  inalienable,  eternal, 
may  open  our  eyes  to  an  arena  where 
to  struggle  is  to  succeed,  where  the 
prizes  are  attainments  rather  than  ac- 
quisitions, character,  not  reputation — 
prizes  whose  crown  is  to  be  like  Christ. 


Strength 

THE  thought  of  strength  growing 
out  of  failure  has  been  already 
more  than  suggested.  The  result  is  not 
inevitable, — forfailure  may  weaken  us 
if  we  let  it, — but  a  result  happily  pos- 
sible, and  always  possible  if  we  will 
have  it  so.  For  though  in  an  unhappy 
moment  the  hand  of  the  carver  may 
slip  and  the  fair  face  be  hopelessly  dis- 
figured, yet  by  all  that  was  hurt,  by  all 
there  was  to  disfigure,  has  the  work- 
man's hand  grown  in  skill.  To  have 
failed  means  to  have  striven,  and  to 
have  striven  means  to  have  grown 
stronger.  A  boy  taunted  for  failing  in 
a  prolonged  attempt  to  answer  a  hard 

15 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

question  said,  "Well,  I  would  rather 
try  and  fail  than  do  as  you  did,  sit  still 
and  do  nothing."  Out  of  the  mouths  of 
babes  and  sucklings  truth  comes,  clear 
as  a  philosopher's  words  and  clearer. 
It  was  the  boy's  way  of  expressing  what 
George  Eliot  meant  when  she  said, 
"Failure  after  long  perseverance  is 
much  grander  than  never  to  have  a 
striving  good  enough  to  be  called  a  fail- 
ure." Why  grander?  Because  to  plan 
to  do  something  worth  doing  in  this 
world,  to  be  a  producer  and  not  a  mere 
consumer,  to  endeavor  to  accomplish 
something  for  God  and  man,  is  a  grand 
thing  of  itself;  to  carry  out  the  idea  by 
thought,  counsel,  prayer,  labor,  perse- 
verance, is  grander  yet.  Does  a  happy 
end  crown  the  work — clear,  unquali- 
fied success  ?  Grandest  of  all,  we  say. 
But  what  of  the  fatal  alternative  ?  W  hat 
16 


THE  SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

if  after  all  the  plans  come  tears  of  dis- 
appointment? What  if  after  all  the 
pains  and  labor  comes  failure?  Is  all 
lost  ?  By  no  means !  The  work  may  be 
a  failure,  but  the  worker  stronger.  The 
thing  may  not  have  been  accomplished, 
but  the  man  be  a  more  accomplished 
man:  and  that  is  God's  point. 

And  so  it  is  grander  to  have  tried  and 
failed  than  never  to  have  tried  at  all, 
by  so  much  as  any  iron  that  has  known 
the  hot  puddling  and  tempering,  and 
gained  qualities  of  steel,  is  better  than 
crude,  raw  ore. 

Ah,  but  if  out  of  failure  a  man  often 
comes  forth  stronger,  how  magnificent- 
ly is  the  strength  of  character  revealed 
and  redoubled  as  a  man  for  conscience' 
sake  goes  deliberately  into  failure,  un- 
der its  shadow  and  stigma,  choosing  to 
suffer  rather  than  to  sin,  to  fail  in  his 
17 


THE   SUCCESS    OF   DEFEAT 

plan  rather  than  to  do  wrong.  Is  it  more 
noble  to  advance  than  to  retreat  ?  Yes, 
in  a  good  cause.  But  if  a  man  disco- 
vers the  cause  unworthy,  it  is  nobler 
and  takes  far  more  moral  muscle  to 
retreat.  To  say  "I  am  in  for  it  and  will 
go  through  anyhow"  may  have  the  fla- 
vor of  heroism,  but  the  fact  and  force 
of  genuine  heroism  is  not  there  at  all. 
Heroism  is  doing  what  is  right,  no 
matter  what  it  costs,  no  matter  how 
much  it  is  worth.  "It  is  better,"  says 
Ruskin,  "to  prefer  honorable  defeat  to 
a  mean  victory,  to  lowering  the  level 
of  our  aim  that  we  may  more  certainly 
enjoy  the  complacency  of  success." 
This  is  to  have  the  thing  succeed  and 
the  man  fail.  God  forbid!  No  matter 
what  becomes  of  dreams,  hopes,  plans, 
pleasures,  ambitions,  fortune,  friends— 
the  man  must  not  fail.  Then  all  is  gone. 

18 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

These  are  the  days  to  believe  this; 
these  are  the  times  to  show  that  we  be- 
lieve it  is  better  to  fail  on  right  princi- 
ples than  to  succeed  on  wrong  ones.  If 
we  find  ourselves  in  a  tangle,  caught 
in  the  meshes  of  selfish,  materialistic 
modes  of  thinking  and  living,  in  busi- 
ness or  social  life,  where  we  know  a  bad 
principle,  a  concession  to  evil,  a  wrong 
method  generally  blinked  at,  will  suc- 
ceed in  getting  us  out  quicker  than 
anything  else,  then  it  is  our  business, 
come  what  may,  to  say,  "  I  will  suffer, 
but  I  will  not  sin ;  I  may  be  wronged, 
but  I  will  not  do  wrong ;  my  hopes  and 
plans  may  fail,  but  I  will  not  be  a  fail- 
ure to  save  them."  God  is  alive.  He  is 
not  mocked.  Character  is  making,  and 
character  is  everything,  and  compro- 
mise kills  it.  What  splendid  reinforce- 
ment comes  to  us  across  the  ages  when 
19 


THE   SUCCESS   OF  DEFEAT 

we  look  at  the  three  young  Hebrews 
on  the  plains  of  Dura,  already  well  on 
in  royal  promotion,  now  challenged  for 
not  bowing  down  before  the  golden 
image,  and  hear  them  say,  as  they  face 
the  fiery  furnace  waiting  to  consume 
them  and  all  their  hopes,  "Our  God 
whom  we  serve  is  able  to  deliver  us 
from  the  burning,  fiery  furnace,  and 
He  will  deliver  us  out  of  thine  hand, 
O  King !  But  if  not,  be  it  known  unto 
thee  that  we  will  not  serve  thy  gods." 
"But  if  not"  —there  is  the  pivot.  We 
will  do  right  though  we  burn !  Alas  for 
the  wrecks  through  fear,  through  con- 
cessions to  gain  some  little  end! — the 
bargains  with  sin  to  avoid  suffering. 
Alas  for  the  selling  of  manhood — the 
shameful  bartering  of  principles — the 
implicit  and  explicit  lies  to  save  a  dar- 
ling project  from  the  dogs!  Alas  for 

20 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

the  sight  of  a  man  playing  with  con- 
science as  with  loaded  dice,  selling  his 
Christian  inheritance  for  a  mess  of  dol- 
lars !  The  sight  of  a  man  with  a  set  of 
convictions  about  him,  going  into  poli- 
tics, and,  to  appease  the  wolves,  throw- 
ing out  these  convictions,  one  by  one, 
sacrificing  character  to  reputation,  and 
personal  success  to  political  ad  vantage! 
The  sight  of  a  fine,  benevolent  scheme, 
which  to  succeed  involves  pandering 
to  the  notoriously  bad;  and  the  pan- 
dering, the  truckling,  is  done  lest 
the  scheme  should  fail — distinctly  un- 
christian devices  resorted  to  lest  the 
thing  should  not  be  a  success — evil 
done  under  the  auspices  of  good !  The 
sight  of  some  social  plan,  some  fashion- 
able alliance,  some  cherished  hope  of 
Distinction  in  Mayfair — and  lest  it 
should  fail,  lest  we  should  be  thought 

21 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

peculiar,  the  Puritan  kisses  the  hand 
of  the  Cavalier,  principles  are  sacri- 
ficed, conscience  stifled,  people  wholly 
unworthy  invited  because  they  are  al- 
ways invited,  men  sought  who  ought 
to  be  shunned,  forms  of  entertainment 
and  amusement  adopted  we  do  not  on 
the  whole  believe  in,  that  put  on  the 
table  before  our  guests  which  we  know 
is  dangerous  to  all  and  deadly  to  some 
— and  all  to  succeed! 

IS  the  end  of  these  things  success? 
Can  anything  succeed  which  has  in  it 
concession,  compromise,  reproach  of 
conscience  ?  Oh  for  the  strength  to  fail ! 
To  fail  splendidly,  because  honorably. 
To  be  poor,  but  clean ;  to  have  fortune 
broken,  but  conscience  whole;  to  have 
friends,  fame,  plans,  pleasures  failing 
outside,  but  honor  unstained,  princi- 

22 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

pies  inviolate,  integrity  integral, — no 
failure  inside.  This  is  to  be  peculiar 
to  some  purpose,  this  is  a  distinction 
warmly  to  be  coveted! 

"For  thence  a  paradox 
Which  comforts  while  it  mocks, 
Shall  life  succeed  in  that  it  seems  to  fail? 

Oh  for  the  strength  of  moral  inflexi- 
bility, for  that  rock-like  conviction  of 
God  and  truth,  and  honor  and  self-re- 
spect, which  dares  failure,  risks  catas- 
trophe, but  keeps  the  faith ! 

For,  mark  it  well,  if  not  in  the  short 
run,  yet  always  in  the  long  run,  the 
men  that  dare  be  true  whatever  the 
risk,  who  so  value  success  with  God 
that  they  will  not  yield  one  inch  of 
honor,  not  one  iota  of  truth  to  succeed 
with  men,  are  the  men  whom  God 
honors,  honors  with  His  own  hand, 
honors  with  power  to  make  mankind 


THE  SUCCESS   OF  DEFEAT 

move  on,  power  to  bring  forth  bene- 
ficent measures,  to  promote  efficacious 
reforms,  to  utter  the  watchwords  of 
new  victories, — power  to  be  the  bene- 
factors, liberators,  saviors  of  their  fel- 
lows,— power  in  the  end  to  command 
the  admiration  and  homage  of  the  very 
ones  who  sneered  at  them,  snubbed 
them  in  polite  forms  of  persecution,  or 
hounded  them  on  to  the  death  in  ruder 
days. 

Nebuchadnezzar  and  the  men  who 
kept  his  furnace  hot  bowed  before  the 
God  of  Shadrach,  Meshach  and  Abed- 
nego.  God  cares  for  the  honor  of  the 
men  who  care  for  the  honor  of  their 
God. 

The  roots  of  true  success  are  well 
grown  in  the  hearts  of  men  who  dare 
to  fail.  During  the  State  Convention 
in  Springfield,  Ohio,  in  1858,  Lincoln 

24 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

read  his  speech  to  twelve  men  in  the 
library  of  the  State  House.  "  Too  ad- 
vanced," said  all  but  Herndon.  Lincoln 
rose,  walked  to  and  fro,  stopped,  and 
said:  "Friends,  I  have  thought  about 
this  matter  a  great  deal,  have  weighed 
the  question  well  from  all  corners,  and 
am  thoroughly  convinced  the  time  has 
come  when  it  should  be  uttered ;  and  if 
I  must  go  down  because  of  this  speech, 
then  let  me  go  down  linked  to  truth 
—die  in  the  advocacy  of  what  is  right 
and  just."  So  spoke  the  man  who  felt 
to  the  full  the  danger  to  himself,  but 
flinched  not  a  hair's  breadth  from  what 
he  felt  was  his  path  of  duty,  who  fig- 
ured on  character,  not  consequences. 


Success 

AID  now  we  come  in  our  thought 
to  its  closing,  if  not  its  highest 
issue — God's  recognition  in  earthly 
success  of  unreckoning  loyalty  that 
dares  to  fail.  How  plainly  He  has  writ- 
ten it  in  human  history  that  failure 
opens  the  way  to  success.  How  often 
has  honest  incompleteness  proved  the 
bud  of  achievement,  and  death  the  gate 
of  life. 

The  old  Christian,  Telemachus, 
throws  himself  into  the  bloody  arena 
between  the  gladiators  killing  each 
other  for  the  people's  amusement.  The 
vicious  thrusts  of  the  contestants  meet 
in  the  old  man  and  he  falls,  slain  by  the 

26 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

sword,  but  a  victor,  for  the  gladiatorial 
shows  were  ended.  The  blood  of  the 
martyrs — was  it  in  vain  ?  No.  The  blood 
of  the  martyrs  was  the  seed  of  the 
Church.  Savonarola,  Huss,  Jerome  of 
Prague,  died  without  the  vision,  burned 
at  the  stake.  Failures?  No.  The  blaze 
of  their  burning  lightened  the  way  by 
which  Luther  and  Calvin  and  Zwingli 
and  Knox  came  out  of  the  dark  to  be 
the  leaders  of  the  new  world. 

The  seed  falls  into  the  ground  and 
disintegrates  in  its  dark  grave.  A  fail- 
ure ?  From  the  dying  grain  the  new  life 
springs.  It  fails  that  success  may  come. 
Dying,  it  abides  not  alone.  From  its 
ruins  the  germ  of  the  future  springs 
up,  the  harvest  comes,  the  bread  of  life, 
to  nourish  a  hungry  world. 

Discouraged  soul,  take  comfort  from 
the  truth.  You  think  your  prayers  have 

27 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

not  been  heard.  Your  plans  for  God, 
your  schemes  of  goodness  and  kind- 
ness, your  longing  for  the  conversion 
of  your  friends,  your  unselfish  zeal,  may 
seem  in  vain.  Shadows  are  gathering 
about  you.  It  looks  as  though  all  were 
to  end  in  failure  in  the  swift  coming 
night.  Pray  on,  work  on — be  faithful 
to  the  end.  God's  plans,  like  His  plants, 
grow  in  the  night.  Sooner  or  later  you 
will  see  that  faithfulness  is  success. 
God  is  not  in  as  much  of  a  hurry  as  we 
are.  Patience  and  fidelity,  these  are 
heroism  and  victory  in  His  sight,  and 
some  day  will  be  so  in  the  sight  of 
every  one. 

O  BELOVED  Christians,  look  up 
to  the  God  who  says  "Well  done,  good 
SLudfaitkful  servant ! "  Doubt  not,  faint 
not,  "bate  not  one  jot  of  heart  and 

28 


THE   SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

hope,  but  still  bear  up  and  steer  right 
onward." 

Jesus  failed!  He  came  to  His  own 
and  His  own  received  Him  not.  He 
stretched  out  His  hands  all  the  day  to 
a  gainsaying  and  rebellious  people.  He 
encountered  deadly  indifference,  fierce 
opposition,  heartless  calumny.  He  was 
betrayed  and  denied  and  deserted  by 
His  friends.  He  was  crucified  by  His 
enemies  at  Jerusalem,  where  He  had 
wept  in  vain.  He  died  between  two 
thieves,  and  was  buried  in  a  stranger's 
grave. 

It  was  a  supreme  failure,  and  yet  su- 
premest  victory. 

"  He  did  not  fail,  neither  was  He  dis- 
couraged." Faithful  unto  death,  He 
cried  "  It  is  finished ! "  and  in  the  cry 
taught  us  that  every  life  that  seeks  in 
love  and  loyalty  to  do  the  will  of  God 

29 


THE  SUCCESS   OF   DEFEAT 

is  a  complete  and  perfect  life,  no  mat- 
ter how  or  where  it  ends;  that  to  be 
faithless  is  to  fail,  whatever  the  appar- 
ent success  of  earth;  that  to  be  faithful 
is  to  succeed  whatever  the  apparent  fail- 
ure of  earth.  In  the  comfort  and  hope 
of  this  glorious  truth  let  us  give  our- 
selves anew  to  God  and  to  the  doing 
and  bearing  of  His  will,  quietly  leav- 
ing the  issues  with  Him,  saying  "My 
judgment  is  with  the  Lord  and  my 
work  with  my  God." 


